Scaling mechanism for efficient wavelength conversion in laser plasmas

• DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.1207.4754
• Publication Date: 2012-01-01
• Authors: Matteo Clerici; Marco Peccianti; Bruno E. Schmidt; Lucia Caspani; Mostafa Shalaby; Mathieu Giguère; Antonio Lotti; A. Couairon; François Légaré; T. Ozaki; Daniele Faccio; Roberto Morandotti
• Keywords: 0103 physical sciences; 0202 electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering; FOS: Physical sciences; 02 engineering and technology; 7. Clean energy; 01 natural sciences; Physics - Optics; Optics (physics.optics)

Laser-induced ionization is a fundamental tool for the frequency conversion of lasers into spectral regions so far inaccessible, including both extreme ultraviolet and terahertz. The low-frequency currents induced by laser-driven generate extremely broadband, single-cycle terahertz pulses, with applications ranging from remote sensing to optical pulse diagnostic, yet strong limitations arise low efficiencies this mechanism. We show remarkable increase radiated energy laser wavelength we relate observation stronger action long-wavelength fields on ionization-induced free-carriers. Ultimately, use mid-infrared pulses instead near-infrared ones employed enables unprecedented table-top generation high (>4 MV/cm) required for, e.g. manipulation quantum states, attosecond synthesis time-resolved studies ultrafast electron dynamics. Furthermore, such allowed us perform space-time resolved diagnostics exploiting standard components.